


cause you know this love's worth saving, baby

by avalanches



Series: just a bit more, we'll reach past our destiny [1]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Psycho-Pass Fusion, Enforcer!Donghyuck, Inspector!Mark, M/M, mentions of rape and violence, self-indulgent 96line interactions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:54:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24944185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avalanches/pseuds/avalanches
Summary: Donghyuck watches him through the silver strands of his fringe, his eyes bright and sad.“We don’t deserve to be put at the mercy of the Sibyl System, but here we are.”Mark doesn’t know how to respond.-alternatively: the self-indulgent nct psycho pass that vic encouraged me to write
Relationships: Dong Si Cheng | WinWin/Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee
Series: just a bit more, we'll reach past our destiny [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1805293
Comments: 17
Kudos: 72





	cause you know this love's worth saving, baby

**Author's Note:**

> for [vic](https://twitter.com/sfthae). thank you for encouraging me, for reading all 11k words of this as i wrote it, for talking about this with me, for everything. i cannot thank you enough, really. 
> 
> title from [daughtry's battleships](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bj0MwP1_fw)
> 
> -
> 
> this started out as a johndo idea, but the markhyuck part grew in convo with vic, and thus this fic was born. i never thought i would write a fic again since stopping in 2018, but here i am. yeet. thanks nct. 
> 
> will be back to fix any mistakes in the future!

It's his first day. 

Mark inhales deeply, feels the weight of his wallet in his back pocket. The building in front of him is black, a sharp silhouette against the pale blue of the morning sky. He eyes his reflection in the glass of the front doors, nods at himself. 

_You can do this._

“Hey kid, you lost or what?” 

He whirls around, nearly tripping on nothing before his quick reflexes save him from face-planting onto the concrete before the owner of the voice ( _damn these shoes, Jaemin had warned him to stretch them out_ ). Mark comes face to face with a tall ( _really tall, his mind supplies unhelpfully_ ) man with a bruise on his left cheek, dark brown hair parted in half, tie undone around his creased collar with a badge hanging out of his breast pocket. 

Mark blinks again, his tongue heavy in his mouth. 

“Oh, you’re the new kid huh? The one with the top scores from SMU?”

Mark nods, not trusting himself to talk. 

The man laughs, light and airy, and moves past him to swipe his badge against the keypad. The doors slide open with a hum, and he looks at Mark over his shoulder with a smirk that barely tugs at his lips. 

“Coming, rookie?” 

Mark nearly trips again trying to keep up with Tall Man, barely wedging himself past the doors sliding shut before he fumbles with his tie and tries to match Tall Man’s pace. Tall Man laughs, coming out like a bark as Mark curses under his breath and regrets not breaking in his new shoes a week before.

“Get some new shoes, rookie. You’ll need them.”

\--

Tall Man’s name is John Seo, and he’s an Inspector in Division 127 of the Criminal Investigation Department. He takes Mark to the twelfth floor, shows him an empty desk, and stares mutely at the empty room. 

“You’ll need to go to Jaehyun two doors down to get your ID, your badge, and your computer. We don’t get a lot of newbies, so it would be nice to give him something to do for once.” 

Mark nods frantically, his mind whirring with the information. John drops himself into a chair beside Mark’s designated workspace, opens up his computer and sticks a cigarette into his mouth as he opens files. 

“Is it only you? In this division?” 

“Nah,” John doesn’t look up from his computer, “you’re early. We have a late start today because we spent last night staking out a drug addict’s place and it ended at like, five. No one remembered that our new Inspector was going to join us today, but Jaehyun blew up my phone, so.” He gestures to himself and hikes up a foot onto his chair. Mark nods. 

“Okay, so I guess I’ll go see Jaehyun? Now?”

“Geez, kid, you talk with way too many question marks,” drawls John, eyes still locked on his screen. “Maybe that’s why they named you Mark, huh? Lee Minhyung?” 

Mark hasn’t told John Seo his name. He isn’t too surprised, this Jaehyun person probably sent a file and John seems like a pretty responsible employee. Other than the sloppy appearance. 

“Jaehyun’s lab is two doors to your left. Please press the bell before you go in. It’s safer for your sanity and is guaranteed to protect your eyes.”

Mark nods slowly. John Seo still hasn’t lit his cigarette and yet, there is no lighter in sight. 

\--

“Come on in!” 

Mark cautiously looks around as the door slides open. The screens are stacked to the ceiling, glowing rectangles of eerie white surrounding a shadowy figure seated in a comfortable ( _gaming? his mind supplies yet again unnecessarily_ ) chair. He takes a few steps forward and stops in front of the table in the middle of the room. 

“Hello?” his voice sounds too loud in this small dark space. “Mr. Jaehyun? I’m Mark Lee. Jo- Inspector Seo sent me to you for my cards and my computer?” 

“Ah yes, Mark! Give me a moment, alright? Babe?” 

_Babe?_ Mark frowns momentarily before another figure emerges from in front of the chair. Oh, there’s someone else here too. 

“Babe, lights please?”

There is a click and harsh white light fills the room. Mark blinks once, his eyes finding a slim figure leaning against the left wall. The man looks him up and down once before raking slim fingers through blonde hair, his face expressionless. 

“Mr. Jaehyun?” 

The blonde jerks his chin towards the figure in the chair. Mark snaps his head back to it rapidly, and the sound of a zipper being pulled up rasps in his ears. 

“That’s me,” the chair turns around to reveal a handsome man with bright pink hair, a gentle smile with two dimples right beside it. “Mark Lee Minhyung, right?” 

“Yes sir,” Mark swallows as the blonde man leans against the wall, eyes still locked on him. He looks awkwardly away from Jaehyun to blondie before jumping into a salute. “Sorry, sir.” 

“Just call me Jaehyun,” Jaehyun smiles at him, eyes crinkling up into soft crescents, dimples becoming more pronounced, “I don’t care for rank or shit. Just give me a while to get your things registered, yeah?” 

Mark bops his head awkwardly as Jaehyun rolls his chair forward to the table he was standing in front of, laptop in one hand and the other stuck in an open drawer beside the large monitors. The blonde man hasn’t moved, his eyes steely as he watches Mark, follows every quiver and nervous tick in his body. 

“That’s Sicheng, by the way. Don’t mind him,” Jaehyun is now tapping furiously on the laptop, and Mark jerks his head back, unaware that he was staring at blondie. _Sicheng_. The laptop was hooked up to a lot of things, including a card reader, a scanner, and the very large screens and monitors that were purring softly behind the pink-haired man. 

“Put your hand on the scanner, Mark,” Jaehyun pushes said device towards him, and Mark obediently does so, watching the green bar travel up and down his hand. Sicheng still hasn’t moved an inch, and Mark settles on watching the card reader flash red, blue, then green. 

“All done,” Jaehyun sings cheerfully, swiping the card off the reader and handing it towards Mark. He slides his chair back, digs into some more drawers, and emerges with another laptop which he hands towards Mark against after swiping it against the card reader. 

“Here you go, and oh, yes. Your badge.” 

Mark takes the small rectangle from Jaehyun, flips it open to find his own face staring back at him. 

_Mark Lee Minhyung. Inspector. ID 20160707-127-02. Criminal Investigation Department. Public Safety Bureau. Ministry of Welfare._

The metal is cool against his fingers, his brain whirring at the information he’s reading. It’s official, he is working here now. No more university, no more nagging at Jaemin and Jeno to finish their readings; they will have to deal with it now that he’s actually working. 

There’s a scoff to his left and Jaehyun shoots a sharp look at the blonde. 

“Be nice, babe.” 

Sicheng shrugs. “Give him a lanyard, _babe_.” 

Jaehyun tosses one Mark’s way without taking his eyes off the other man. Mark catches it easily, slings it around his neck and slides his card into it before picking up the laptop. He looks up to find Jaehyun and Sicheng locked in a staring match with the pink-haired man dragging his tongue _very slowly_ across his lips. 

“Is that all?” 

Jaehyun looks back at him, slightly startled. Sicheng smirks, and finally pushes himself off the wall, walking towards Mark. 

“Come on, let me take you back to Johnny before he thinks we seduced you into a threesome or something. Babe, how about you introduce yourself properly to the rookie?” 

“Oh!” Jaehyun blinks rapidly before rolling his chair forward (Mark sees Sicheng roll his eyes), “right. I’m Jung Jaehyun, I’m the tech analyst for Division 127. You’ll get all your files and stuff from me, and I’m the one running all the crime data too.” He sticks his hand up in front of Mark, pink hair fluffy and cheeks puffed up from the wide smile on his face. 

“Nice to meet you!” 

Mark shakes his hand awkwardly. “Nice to meet you too.” 

Jaehyun grins at him before spinning his chair around and pulling himself back to the large monitors. “That will be all, rookie. Babe, take him back to Johnny and come back here quick, alright? Don’t lose him now.” 

Sicheng scoffs. He taps the switch and gestures towards the corridor as the door slides open, one side of his mouth pulled up in a small smirk. 

“After you, rookie.”

\--

“Oh, you’re back. _Oh._ Sicheng?” 

Sicheng waves his hand lazily at John Seo. “Yo.” 

“Bastard,” John rolls his eyes before pushing back from his desk. “How’s-”

“He’s fine,” Sicheng replies, watching Mark trot to his desk and begin setting up his computer, making no effort to enter the room. “He doesn’t want to talk to you.”

John’s lips press tightly together and Mark senses that he’s upset. Or disappointed. Mark isn’t really good at reading emotions, and John Seo isn’t exactly an open book. The senior inspector sighs and turns back to his laptop. 

“Thanks for delivering the rookie. Now go back to sucking Jaehyun’s dick or something.” 

Sicheng opens his mouth to retort, but he’s cut off by a shrilling alarm that makes Mark jump in his new chair. John Seo sighs dramatically. 

“Well, make sure you don’t trip in those new shoes, rookie. Come on, let’s go.” 

\--

It’s pouring so heavily that the waterproof windbreaker does absolutely nothing to prevent Mark’s suit from getting soaked. Even under the tent set up for their shelter, the wind whips rainwater their way and Mark regrets, not for the first time that day, his decision to wear the new shoes without breaking them in before. 

To be fair, he hadn’t expected to be out on the field on his first day. 

“Sorry, kid,” John Seo sighs, unlit cigarette still hanging from the corner of his lips, watching a small case roll itself into the middle of the sheltered area, “we’re kind of understaffed. I won’t have time to brief you, not with Taeil on leave.” 

Moon Taeil, Mark had learnt, was another senior inspector in Division 127. He had taken a week’s leave for his sister’s wedding, hence his absence. John had been working alone since Monday. That explained the dark bags under the older man’s eyes, and maybe the sloppy appearance of his clothes. 

Mark nods. “I’ll try to learn on the job, sir.” 

John Seo watches him for a bit before barking out a laugh. He claps Mark’s shoulder and his mouth stretches into a friendly grin. 

“Hey, loosen up. No need for ‘sir’ or anything. Jaehyun probably said the same thing to you too, right?” He seems satisfied when Mark nods in affirmation. “We don’t care about rank or shit in 127, just call me Johnny. That’s what everyone calls me anyways.” 

Mark nods again. He’s doing a lot of that on his first day; that means he’s doing well, right? 

The loud purr of an automobile engine reaches his ears and he looks up to see a blocky black vehicle pull into the restricted area marked off by the striped tape. Beside him, Johnny has stilled, cigarette (still unlit) pressed in between his teeth, the tension clear in his jaw. 

_A prisoner vehicle?_

“These people aren’t like us, Mark,” Johnny shifts his weight from one foot to another, the muscles in his neck taut with agitation. “They are hunting dogs.”

“Hunting dogs?” 

“They are Enforcers,” Johnny glances at him, keeping his other eye on the prisoner vehicle headed their way, “people with Crime Coefficients that exceeded the specified healthy amount.” 

_Enforcers_ . Mark had learnt about them in his psychology curriculum. They were humans kept on a leash, people with higher Crime Coefficients than the average healthy citizen living in Neo City. _People who should be in jail._

“They are latent criminals?” 

“Yes, and no,” Johnny cracks his neck. The prisoner vehicle is now slowly backing towards them, getting ready to set into a parking position. “They would normally be classified as such, but these humans are allowed to step into our world for the sole purpose of hunting others just like them. Others who are flagged by the system and try to run. Others who threaten the stability of our world with their murky hues and volatile temperance and mental imbalance.” 

_Latent criminals who hunt other latent criminals_. 

It isn’t anything Mark doesn’t know, but hearing Johnny explain this, coupled together with the heavy doors of the prisoner vehicle falling open somehow makes the concept seem so foreign to him. He watches four figures filter out of the vehicle, and his breath catches in his throat. 

They are all ridiculously young. 

The first man who steps out of the vehicle is dressed well in a classic, dark blue duffle coat with his black haired styled carefully into a comma style. His dress shirt and pants are carefully ironed, and his shoes are expensive even if Mark doesn’t know the brand. He’s followed by a man with shaggy white hair and an intricate undercut pattern visible from under the long pale strands. When he spots Johnny and Mark, his face lights up immediately as he runs over to greet the senior Inspector excitedly. 

“Johnny! Oh my god, is this the rookie?” 

“Be nice, Yuta,” Johnny smirks at the Enforcer, who is dressed in a white sweatshirt with long sleeves and Japanese characters printed boldly on the front, “this is Inspector Mark Lee. He’ll be joining Division 127 from today onwards.” 

“Sweet!” Yuta grins brightly. “Nice to meet you Inspector Lee, I’m Yuta! I’m one of the Enforcers assigned to the 127 squad!” 

“I told you not to call us that,” Mark’s head snaps around at the familiar voice before he comes eye to eye with a familiar smirk and a head of blonde hair. “Hello again, rookie.”

“Sicheng?” 

“Oh, you’ve met him already?” Yuta pouts as the other slowly comes forward, eyes locked on the case beside Mark. “No fair, Winwin-ie!” 

“Stop whining, we have a job.” 

The first dark-haired man is standing on Yuta’s other side now, eyes locked on Mark in a steel gaze. While Yuta and Sicheng had seemed friendly and normal enough for him to believe that they were possibly not latent criminals (though, they just proved otherwise), this man radiated danger and sharpness off his very being. Mark meets his gaze, holds his ground. 

“Inspector Mark Lee, I’m with Division 127 starting from today.”

“Don’t repeat information that has already been given,” the man looks off to the side, his eyes lingering on Johnny for a while before focusing on the dark alley ahead. “I just want to finish this and go back to my book.” 

“Ignore Doyoung-hyung. He can be such a downer.” 

Mark’s heart stops a bit when he finally finds the owner of the voice, and the last Enforcer of the group. He isn’t sure why. Maybe it’s because the owner has the brightest, saddest eyes, the most beautiful tanned skin, and a wonderful figure that reminds Mark that he is, indeed, gay. 

Maybe it’s because he’s a boy, and he doesn’t look that much older than Mark. 

The bright, sad eyes find his, and Mark thinks that the boy’s smile is like the sun. 

“Hi,” the boy Enforcer stretches out his hand, and Mark takes it firmly, awed into silence. 

“My name’s Donghyuck. Nice to meet you, Inspector Mark Lee.” 

\-- 

There was no game plan or anything. 

Mark wipes one hand on his already wet slacks (thanks to the rain) and breathes in deeply though his nose. A few steps ahead of him, Doyoung shoots him an annoyed look. 

Right, he wasn’t supposed to make too much noise. 

_“Yuta, Sicheng, with me,” Johnny says as the case in between them falls open and reveals six heavy guns. Mark blinks at the sight as Sicheng and Johnny grab one each, the blonde hefting his weapon in his hand with a sigh before falling into step behind the Inspector._

_“Eeeeeh, no fair! I wanted to work with Markie!” Yuta whines before settling his hand on one of the guns as well. There is a soft click before the Japanese man lifts it up and turns puppy eyes on Johnny, who is unaffectedly checking his own weapon._

_“I can’t supervise Mark, unfortunately. So I have to make sure he’s left with someone responsible. Doyoung?”_

_The dark-haired man hums, not looking at Johnny. Mark notices how the Inspector’s jaw tenses before he looks away and clicks his tongue at Yuta._

_“Mark, you’ll be with Doyoung and Donghyuck. Anything you’re not sure about, just ask Doyoung, okay?” Said Enforcer still hasn't looked up from where he was perusing the guns, and Johnny sighs before gesturing to Yuta, who was still looking at him hopefully._

_“C’mon guys.”_

_Johnny is gone like that, melted into the shadows with Yuta and Sicheng on his tail. Mark breathes in deeply, and turns to the other two Enforcers._

_Donghyuck smiles at him, his hand on one of the guns already, and pulls it up after a click. Doyoung, on the other hand, is just staring at the case, tapping his foot to an unknown rhythm._

_Mark clears his throat awkwardly. Donghyuck bites back a giggle. Mark hates that he thinks that it’s cute, even if said boy is holding a lethal weapon._

_“So, do we follow them?”_

_“It’s up to you,” Doyoung replies loftily. He hasn’t made a move towards the guns. “You can tell us to be on standby, or you can tell us to go search like the other team.”_

_“Come on, hyung,” Donghyuck stamps his foot on the ground, grinning at Mark despite his words being directed at the other Enforcer, “we gotta earn that paycheck.”_

_“Okay,” Mark inhales again, steps forward to the remaining two guns. “Let’s go.”_

_Doyoung gestures towards the guns without looking up. “After you.”_

_Donghyuck peers at him as he wraps his fingers around the grip of the fun, steadies his hold. “You know how Dominators work right?”_

_“Dominators?” Oh. They have a name, right._

_An automated female voice echoes in his ears and he is greeted with a virtual screen showing his credentials before the voice announces that he is indeed an authorised figure to wield the Dominator. He blinks away the holograms and looks up into Donghyuck’s face, which had been rearranged into an unreadable expression._

_“Point them at any person, and they will tell you the individual’s Crime Coefficient,” Doyoung answers, his voice sounding like a lecture recording. “It will automatically set the attack mode depending on how much of a threat the target is considered to be, but it’s otherwise usually in tranquiliser mode. The directed authorisation voice will give you the necessary instructions. Don’t think so much about it.”_

_“Okay.” Mark swallows again. Doyoung reaches for the last gun (Dominator, his mind reminds him again) and suddenly his steel gaze is on Mark again. Mark tightens his grip on his own weapon, and looks around for Donghyuck only to realise that the other Enforcer is gone._

_“It’s fine, Hyuck often does that,” Doyoung rolls his head around once before looking at Mark again, the steel still present in his eyes._

_“Come on, rookie, let’s go hunt.”_

Mark shakes his wet hair out of his eyes, making sure to keep up with Doyoung. The Enforcer moves like a panther; soft, stealthy, and smooth. His entire being screams predator, and Mark couldn’t help but point his Dominator at him. 

**_Crime Coefficient: 326. Kim Dongyoung. Registered as an Enforcer of Division 127 with the Criminal Investigative Department. Crime Coefficient Limit: 370._ **

Oh, so Doyoung _is_ a latent criminal. 

“You are allowed to shoot me if my Coefficient breaks the limit.”

Doyoung doesn’t seem phased that Mark had pointed his Dominator at him. He’s scanning the streets below them carefully, his eyes dark against his pale skin. Mark chances a quick glance around for himself, noting that Donghyuck is still missing. 

“Don’t be too amazed by my number,” the Enforcer pushes himself off the railing, eyes of steel turned back on Mark, who tries desperately not to shrink under it. 

“It’s high, but it’s not the highest amongst us.” 

\--

They catch the scuffling target entirely by chance, an unconscious woman slung over his shoulder. Doyoung makes a gesture, and they are running in front of the man, Dominators pointed squarely in his face. 

“Drop the guns!” 

The man’s voice is a deranged shriek, trembling hands holding a knife far too close to the woman’s neck. Mark tamps down his pulse, thrumming too hard and too fast in his throat, and steadies himself. 

**_Crime Coefficient: 330. Lethal Eliminator mode authorised._ **

Beside him, Doyoung catches his eye. To Mark’s surprise, the Enforcer shrugs, lifts his left hand and slowly puts his Dominator on the ground. Mark carefully follows suit, ignoring the bile threatening to rise up in his throat due to the nerves as his eyes dart from Doyoung to the woman and the knife shaking near her juglar. 

Doyoung slides his Dominator over to the man and stands back up, hands lifted in a sign of surrender. Mark does the same, his teeth digging into his lower lip as he watches the target move. _How could Doyoung be so calm in a situation like this?_

The man laughs, a mix of insane relief and barely contained glee. He drops the woman, her body hitting the ground with a dull thud and rolling against the rails before staying still. He snatches up Doyoung’s Dominator and points it at the Enforcer, his eyes opening wide. 

“Die! You scumbags!” 

The Dominator glows red, but doesn’t fire. The man panics, his trembling fingers desperately pressing the trigger again and again. 

“Fire! You stupid fucking gun! Why don’t you fucking work?” 

Mark readies himself to dash forward, thinking about the best angle to catch the target by surprise so that he can knock the Dominator out of his hand and restrain him at the same time. Beside him, Doyoung hasn’t moved, but his eyes aren’t watching the target at all. 

Mark follows his gaze, and he catches a shock of silver hair perched on the fifth floor of the building adjacent to his left. 

“No-” 

Just as Mark turns his eyes back onto the target standing before him, the man lets out a strangled scream before erupting in a mess of blood and bones. 

Doyoung sighs. 

\--

“You shouldn’t have killed him.” 

Donghyuck raises an eyebrow at him. Johnny is directing the crime scene clean-up crew around while Yuta and Sicheng help with picking up bagged evidence. Doyoung is cleaning his Dominator with some wipes and supplies a few feet away from Mark, but the Inspector can still feel his eyes on his back as he stomped towards the youngest Enforcer. 

“His Crime Coefficient was high enough that the Lethal Eliminator mode was activated,” the boy Enforcer states, his tone similar to a reluctant student picked on to read out the selected passage in class. “I just followed the Dominator’s instructions.” 

Mark breathes in deeply. “I could have taken him. Not like he could use the Dominator.” 

Donghyuck shrugs, shaking his silver fringe out. Mark hates how good he looks like this, the contrast of his pale hair against his tanned skin, curved lips set firmly in a stubborn line. He matches the Inspector’s gaze head-on, a challenge set in his brown eyes. 

“Right, sure, at what cost? At the risk of your own life? He hadn’t let go of the knife.” 

Mark hates that the Enforcer is right. “It still doesn’t justify killing him.” 

Donghyuck scoffs loudly and looks away. 

“Nothing justifies anything with the Sibyl System. We are all reduced to numbers which determine whether we can live normal lives or we have to be restrained by the system. We are either human, beast, or dead.” 

_It’s not right_ , Mark thinks. 

But before the words come out of his mouth, a shriek pierces his ears, and he vaguely registers the hum of Doyoung’s Dominator whirring to life near him. 

It was the girl who had been kidnapped. She had just woken up, her eyes wide with confusion and fear, drenched in the blood of her kidnapper who had been reduced to a mess of blood and bones. Mark runs towards her, tries to take her hands. 

“Miss, it’s alright, you’re safe now!” 

She’s not looking at him. She’s looking at something behind him, her lips trembling, her eyes bulging with terror. Her hands, stained with red, are reaching behind her, searching for something to hold on, to move towards. 

Mark turns around and comes face-to-face with the barrel of Donghyuck’s Dominator. 

“Check her Coefficient with your Dominator, Inspector.” 

He looks back and forth from her terrified face to Donghyuck’s, his eyes cold, refusing to budge, locked on his target. Behind the Enforcer, Mark vaguely registers Johnny’s voice shouting orders, Yuta telling the clean-up team to stay back. 

“Donghyuck, no, please! She’s terrified. Let me talk to her.” 

“Inspector Lee,” Donghyuck’s voice is cold and unflinching, “the Dominator has judged her as a threat. She needs to be eliminated.” 

Mark watches the Dominator expand, like a python slowly unhinging its jaw to swallow its prey whole, bright blue light shining with the unlocking mechanism. 

_It’s not right. She’s a victim. Why is she a threat?_

“Stop it!” 

Mark brings his own Dominator up without thinking. 

The sound is muted in his ears as he watches the boy Enforcer collapse to the ground in front of him, eyes wide in disbelief and confusion before he hits the floor with a thud. 

\-- 

“Do you think Donghyuck will be angry at me?” 

Johnny looks over at him, another unlit cigarette dangling from his mouth. They are back in the office, and Jaehyun has provided Mark with a spare pair of pants to wear while his bloody ones are being washed in the meantime. 

Mark clenches and unclenches his fist, his eyes trained on his laptop open in front of him, but not actually reading anything on the screen. Johnny shrugs, he doesn’t seem to think that it is such a big deal. 

“Depends on him I guess. He has never been shot by an Inspector before. Doyoung goes absolutely _ballistic_ after he wakes up.” 

Mark blinks. “You shot Doyoung before?” 

“Multiple times,” Johnny looks back at his own screen. “He still gets angry, even if it _was_ his fault.” 

There is a sensitive subject there, one that concerns the Inspector’s relationship with the aforementioned Enforcer, and Mark isn’t brave enough to poke that snake. Instead, he sighs, clenches his fist again, and decides against his better judgement to ask another question. 

“Why is Doyoung’s Crime Coefficient so high?” 

“That’s not my story to tell,” Johnny is typing rapidly now, the sound loud in the office. 

“Donghyuck’s really young right? Is he even allowed to be an Enforcer?”

Johnny’s typing stops. The Inspector still doesn’t look at Mark. 

“Donghyuck is...special. They all are, really. The Enforcers assigned to our division have the highest combined Crime Coefficients in the history of Enforcers.” 

Mark frowns. “And I was assigned here, because?” 

Johnny shrugs, his gaze finally sliding over to Mark. There is no malice in his eyes, no judgement either, just a weird mixture of resignation and pity, tinged with a bit of sadness? 

“I don’t know, Mark Lee. You tell me. You _chose_ to be assigned to the Criminal Investigation Department specifically. So, you tell me.” 

\-- 

Doyoung is by Donghyuck’s bedside when Mark comes in with a fruit basket. He doesn’t look at Mark when the Inspector sets his gift on the bedside table. 

“Is John Seo in the office?” 

Mark starts. He didn’t think that the Enforcer would actually speak to him. He nods, eyes darting towards the door that he had just stepped through. Doyoung sighs ( _he seems to do that a lot, Mark’s brain observes_ ), and stands up, gesturing for Mark to take his seat. 

“He should be waking up in about ten minutes or so. Talk to him, explain yourself.” 

“I-”

Doyoung holds up a hand to silence him. “To _him_ , not me.” 

The older Enforcer is dressed in a cobalt cardigan with white stripes on the sleeves and on the hem, covering a white tee underneath. He is wearing slacks instead of the pressed dress pants that Mark had seen on him at their first meeting, and suddenly it hits him how _ordinary_ Doyoung looks. He could pass for a graduate student visiting his friend in the hospital. 

Mark looks up at Doyoung’s face, and is yet again reminded of the steel in the older Enforcer’s eyes. Doyoung watches him for a bit, turns on his heel, and leaves. The door slides shut with a whisper as he exits. 

Mark is left alone with an Enforcer, in a hospital bed, about to wake up from the effects of the tranquiliser that _he_ had shot said Enforcer with. 

He doesn’t know what to say to Donghyuck. 

\-- 

To his relief, Donghyuck doesn’t shout at him. He doesn’t seem angry at all. 

He’s eating a peach from the fruit basket that Mark had brought. There is a small stack of containers filled with food on the bedside table as well. Donghyuck had explained that they were from Doyoung; the older Enforcer apparently likes to cook, and does it extremely well. 

“I’m not angry at you, by the way. For shooting me.” 

Mark was definitely _not_ expecting that from him. 

“I didn’t want to shoot her,” Donghyuck’s face is calm, but his voice is sad, “she was terrified. How could she not be? Covered in the blood of her abuser, having been raped multiple times, and suddenly there is a big scary gun pointing in her face and someone saying that she has to be eliminated? That’s so much to go through, especially in five hours of your life.” 

Mark wipes his palms on the borrowed pants. “She’s fine now, they’ve taken her into counseling for her hue. Her Crime Coefficient went down after I shot you and you collapsed in front of her.” 

Donghyuck hums, licking his fingers to savor the sweet aftertaste of the peach. Mark tries very hard not to stare. Key word: _tries_. 

“That’s good,” he finally looks over at Mark, his expression still unreadable. 

“If you didn’t want to shoot her, why did you still point your Dominator at her?” 

“It’s because the Dominator dictated so,” Donghyuck doesn’t look away, “I can’t actually disobey the Dominator. As an Enforcer, I am its slave.” 

“You’re not,” Mark’s throat is tight, “you can still think. And you thought that she didn’t deserve it. You didn’t want to shoot her. You knew she didn’t have to die.” 

Donghyuck watches him through the silver strands of his fringe, his eyes bright and sad. 

“We don’t deserve to be put at the mercy of the Sibyl System, but here we are.” 

Mark doesn’t know how to respond. 

“You are the master, the superior, deemed worthy by the Sibyl System. I am the hunting dog, a beast on a leash, a beast ordered to hunt other beasts. All because your mental state apparently calculates to below 100, and mine is a constant 366, only allowed to peak until 400 before the System deems me too much of a threat and needs me gone.” 

Donghyuck smiles at him. Mark can’t bring himself to look away from those eyes, so bright and sad. They look misplaced on Donghyuck’s young face, sorrow and suffering etched into his very being, radiating out of his brown eyes that are somehow still brighter than the sun.

“Some people deserve to die, yet they don’t. Yet, people like her, like me, like my hyungs, we apparently deserve death?” 

Mark shakes his head, his tongue heavy in his mouth. 

Donghyuck sighs quietly, the smile still on his face. However, it has changed. It’s no longer sad. Mark senses a bit of relief, something tight being loosened, some gratitude. 

“Come,” Donghyuck reaches for the containers with Doyoung’s cooking, “go help me with heating this up in the microwave there. Then bring it back and help me finish it. Doyoung-hyung always cooks _way_ too much.”

Mark takes the containers dumbly, distracted by the smile on the boy Enforcer’s face. 

_He smiles like the sun when there’s no sadness in it._

\--

“Did you make up with Donghyuck?” 

Mark didn’t expect to be greeted by this scene when he returned to the office. Doyoung is sitting on one side of Johnny’s desk, eyes of steel fixed on Mark, while the Inspector types on his computer.

The cigarette was gone from his mouth, Mark realised. 

“Yeah,” he thinks back to the boy Enforcer’s beaming face as he inhaled the kimchi stew and fried dumplings, “he wasn’t really angry at me anyways. Said he deserved it.” 

Johnny laughs and slaps Doyoung’s thigh, hand lingering there for a bit. “See, Doie, he’s not you. You’re literally the only person who gets so upset whenever you get tranquilised.” 

Doyoung snorts. “You do it far too often that I suspect that you just like making me angry.” 

Johnny’s hand doesn’t move from the Enforcer’s thigh. “Hmm, maybe?”

Doyoung rolls his eyes. Mark awkwardly clears his throat. 

“He invited me to eat your food with him, Mr. Doyoung, I hope you didn’t mind.” 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, don’t call me Mister,” Doyoung takes the bag from Mark’s hands, opening it to check the containers inside. “Reminds me of worse days.” 

“Call him sir,” Johnny offers snarkily, scrolling down his laptop screen with his left hand. Doyoung smacks him on the shoulder, the action devoid of malice or intention to hurt, before turning to face Mark again.

“Just call me hyung,” he shrugs, “you’re part of the family now. You’re with us.” 

“Doyoung-ie,” the Senior Inspector whines, suddenly throwing his arms around the Enforcer’s waist and squishing his face into Doyoung’s stomach, “why didn’t you cook for me? You cooked for Hyuckie and the rookie. You never pack Hyuck too much fo--”

He’s cut off when the dark-haired man gracefully slides off the desk and flicks him back into his chair with a finger to his forehead. Mark sees the steel gaze soften, sees Johnny’s eyes linger on the Enforcer’s face a bit longer, hands wrapped loosely around Doyoung’s waist.

“Don’t whine.” 

Johnny pouts up at the other man, and Mark thinks that he looks like a child instead of the bad, annoyed, overworked Inspector that he had been dealing with for most of the day. Donghyuck’s voice echoes in the back of his head. 

_“We don’t deserve to be put at the mercy of the Sibyl System, but here we are.”_

He had wanted this job, sure, but had Johnny wanted it? Or did he just do it because he had been assigned by the system.

Doyoung brushes a thumb tenderly across the bruise on Johnny’s cheek, nods at Mark and leaves the office. The young Inspector sits down at his desk, and he doesn’t miss the way Johnny’s eyes follow Doyoung’s figure as the Enforcer moves. There is a mix of emotions in his eyes, and yet again, Mark can’t really make out all of them. 

“Johnny?”

The Senior Inspector turns to look at him, and his eyes are back to the tired, overworked law enforcer who hasn’t slept more than three hours in the past three days. He nods towards Mark’s computer before turning back to his own. 

“C’mon rookie, you gotta finish that report on shooting Hyuck and submit it by today.” 

\--

“Oh? Is this the rookie?” 

Mark jumps at the unfamiliar voice. A shock of white-blonde hair shoots up in front of him, fringe cropped short above meticulously shaped eyebrows and wide eyes. His Korean is accented, his features are East Asian, but definitely not local.

Oh, he’s kind of _short_. 

“Not nice to say that, rookie,” Unfamiliar Man snaps at him, wagging a finger at him in contempt. “Not, nice. At, all.” 

A familiar sigh echoes from behind him, and Mark nearly drops his plate of fried udon noodles. He turns around to see Doyoung seated at one of the tables in the cafeteria, fingers attached to the plastic body of an iced beverage. 

He’s not alone. The other man seated at the table has dark blue hair that falls into his eyes and is nursing another drink as well. He has a kind face, with wide round eyes, and he’s watching Mark with interest. In between them is an empty chair, pushed back as though its occupant had recently vacated it. 

_Oh._

Mark turns back around to look at Unfamiliar Man, who is undoubtedly the occupant of the vacated chair. 

“Hello?”

“Leave him alone, Ten-ah,” the blue-haired man calls out. Doyoung sighs again dramatically and nods to the other empty chair at the table. 

“Sit.” 

Mark sits down, eyes flickering in between the three of them. Were they all Enforcers, buddies with Doyoung? Ten seems a bit too carefree, but Mark could see the sharpness in his eyes as he followed every move the young Inspector made. The blue-haired man on the other hand, smiles warmly at Mark and extends his hand for a handshake. 

“Mark Lee, right? Welcome to the Criminal Investigation Department!” 

Mark warily takes his hand before noticing the familiar badge hanging from his breast pocket and a similar lanyard to his looped around his neck. _Oh, an Inspector?_

Blue-hair smiles at him, squeezing his hand gently and firmly. “I’m Senior Inspector Qian Kun from Division V. I graduated university with Johnny Seo.” He looks at the silver-haired man, who is back in his seat, bopping his leg up and down with excitement. 

“I’m Ten!” Unfamiliar Man chirps excitedly, grinning at Mark. He makes no move to offer his hand to the Inspector, instead choosing to keep his hands wrapped around his drink cup. “I’m an Enforcer registered with Division V. I work with Kun-ie here, and we are Doyoung-ie’s friends!” 

Doyoung snorts, takes a long sip of his drink, but doesn’t bother to correct Ten. 

“We're all the same age,” he explains, finally looking at Mark. “And we used to be part of the same division. We worked together.” 

“Oh,” Mark blinks, his mind trying to process the same information. “Wait, so-”

“Nope, nope,” Ten gleefully pops the “p” sound in his words. “Doyoung-ie and I were both Enforcers from the very beginning. And Kun-ie was a rookie, just like you!” 

Kun looks scandalised at the mention of his rookie days. Doyoung laughs, his mouth open wide as he shoves Ten gently. 

“Don’t remind Kun,” Mark is surprised by how innocent they all look. Like Doyoung, Ten is dressed casually in a plain black sweatshirt, dotted with holes and the sleeves pulled over his knuckles. Kun’s collar is open, his tie loose, and he joins in with the laughter as Ten grasps Doyoung’s hand and mimics the motion of slamming it down on the table. 

Mark watches them, noodles forgotten. They look so _ordinary_ , hanging out like the friends that Ten had said they were. Teasing, playing, sipping their drinks and laughing at each other in the cafeteria like ordinary employees at an ordinary company. The irony was that neither of them worked a normal job, and that two out of three of them were not considered normal at all. 

_Labeled by the system_ , Donghyuck’s voice echoes in his head again. 

He’s suddenly aware that the three men seated at the table have stopped laughing, and Ten and Kun’s eyes are trained on him intensely. Doyoung meanwhile, is playing with the long sleeves of his cardigan for a bit before he looks at Mark too, the steel back in his eyes. 

“So,” Doyoung drags out the syllable a bit longer than necessary, cocking his head to one side. “You have questions right, ask away.”

Mark fumbles with his chopsticks. “Really?” 

Kun nods, playing with the sleeve around his drink. “Johnny won’t answer most of them, I know he won’t. But we’ll do our best to answer the burning questions that you have.” 

Mark chances a glance at Doyoung. The Enforcer looks back at him, his mouth set in a loose smirk. “Even the personal ones?” 

“Like why is my Crime Coefficient so high?” Doyoung shrugs, he doesn’t seem to find the question surprising. “Sure. I don’t understand why Johnny won’t tell you. I’m not ashamed of it.” 

“Not a lot of us are,” Ten states, bending his straw back and forth, “Johnny is somehow very touchy about it. Don’t know why he has a stick up his ass about these matters.” 

Kun smiles reassuringly at Mark, tapping his fingers on the table. 

“Ask away rookie, and eat your noodles while you’re at it.” 

Doyoung’s face screws up in disgust. “If you can stand eating that shit, go ahead.”

\--

“Not all Enforcers have committed crimes, right?”

Johnny seems bewildered by Mark’s question. Inspector Moon Taeil on the other hand, looks at Mark over his laptop with a neutral expression. 

“No,” he cracks his neck and stretches for a bit, “for one, Donghyuck hasn’t committed any. He was flagged down by the system before the crime happened.” 

Mark knows the boy Enforcer’s story. Not all of it, just in three short sentences from Doyoung’s mouth, summarising how Donghyuck had ended up being labeled as a latent criminal by his Crime Coefficient in a neighbourhood sweep. 

“It’s not exactly fair to label them as latent criminals when they haven’t done anything, right?” Mark stares at the blinking cursor on his document, the report waiting for him. “They haven’t actually committed the crime.” 

Johnny is silent. Taeil’s lips turn up in a soft, sad smile. 

“That’s just how the system works.” 

\--

Donghyuck comes to visit him one day at the office. 

“Markie~!” he sing-songs his way cheerfully in, a lunch bag grasped in his hand, “Doyoung-ie hyung made us some food! He says you’re better off not eating that crap from the cafeteria.” 

Taeil laughs as Donghyuck wraps an arm around his shoulders and kisses the older Inspector’s head affectionately. “Did Doyoung make some for all of us?” 

“Yep,” the young Enforcer sets the lunch bag down, unzipping it with a flourish, “it’s kimchi fried rice today! Paired with wonderful soft scrambled eggs that Johnny-hyung loves but won’t get!” 

Johnny’s head, which had been stuck to the surface of his desk in front of his laptop jerks up at Donghyuck’s words. “What?” 

Donghyuck clicks his tongue. “Sorry, I meant all of us except Johnny-hyung.” 

Johnny groans, his head dropping back to its original position with a thud. 

Taeil watches him for a bit, letting Donghyuck unpack the lunchbox next to him. “He’s probably in Jaehyun’s lab, keeping him company. You know how Jae has been, with the transfer. Your share is probably there, Doyoung never forgets about you.” 

The other Senior Inspector’s shoulders slump and Mark can see in his head the way Johnny’s lips press into that thin line when he’s irritated or upset, or both. Johnny’s face is turned away from him, but Mark has learnt to read his senior’s moods via body language, more or less. He still hasn’t figured out the complex emotions that appear on Johnny’s face when Doyoung is around though. That’s an entirely different web that Mark cannot bring himself to unravel. 

There is a tug on his arm and Mark looks up into bright, sad eyes crinkled up in a smile that shines like the sun. Donghyuck looks _so young_ when he smiles, and Mark’s heart hurts at the reminder that he is just a year younger. 

“Come on, Markie,” the sun smiles at him, golden skin and bright eyes, “let’s go on a date.” 

\--

Mark didn’t realise that there was an outdoor park in the building. 

Or well, an outdoor park built for the indoors. Donghyuck sets the lunch bag down on a picnic mat and starts pulling out food containers, fancy glasses, and a plastic bottle with the words “RED WINE” written in bold letters across the label. 

“We’re drinking?” 

Donghyuck snorts. “Relax, Mister Inspector. It’s grape juice,” he uncaps the bottle and holds it out towards Mark for him to sniff. “It was a joke. Johnny-hyung lost a bet to Yuta-hyung and he had to label all the bottles without Doyoung-hyung finding out. As you can imagine, he definitely did not get away with it, but well, we still have these.” 

Mark settles himself down on the picnic mat, crosses his legs nervously, and watches the boy Enforcer pour grape juice into the two fancy glasses. He takes the one offered to him, sips at it as he watches Donghyuck open containers and pull out cutlery. 

“Does Doyoung-hyung cook every day?”

“Oh, you’re calling him hyung now, good! He will be so happy to know that,” Donghyuck beams at him while shoving a container of kimchi fried rice at him. “Yeah, he does. Especially when we aren’t deployed to the field and his requested books haven’t arrived.” 

Mark takes the container and his stomach rumbles. He’s blessed enough that he has food when he goes home, Jaemin and Jeno are amazing cooks, but on the days that he’s stuck in the office there are not many choices in the cafeteria. 

He has to begrudgingly admit, Doyoung’s cooking is on another level. There is a certain warmth in the food that the older Enforcer cooks, a contrast to his cool, polished, aloof image. It is clear that Doyoung cares deeply for the Division, and especially for the Enforcers. Even if he never explicitly speaks the words or expresses the emotions. 

Donghyuck hands him a spoon and they dig in. The scrambled eggs are just the right amount of fluffy and creamy, and the fried rice has generous chunks of chicken and onions. Mark watches the boy Enforcer scarf down his food, round cheeks puffed up in happiness, and the pang in his heart returns. 

“Stop looking at me like that,” Donghyuck points his chopsticks at him, mid-way to some boiled spinach set on the mat, “we are on a date. Happy emotions only.” 

“A date,” Mark reaches for some fishcake, “that I don’t remember agreeing to.” 

Donghyuck laughs. “But you’re here, hmm?” His eyes are crescents with the motion, the artificial light dancing off his golden skin. 

Mark smiles, but the pang in his chest doesn’t go away. 

“Yeah, I don’t think I could have refused.” 

Donghyuck’s laughter is one of the most beautiful things he has ever heard. 

\-- 

Donghyuck hooks his ankle around Mark’s from where they are sitting on the picnic mat. 

The artificial flavor of the grape juice lingers on Mark’s tongue as he looks over at the boy Enforcer. Donghyuck is looking back at him, lower lip pressed to the rim of his own glass. 

“Don’t pity me, Mark Lee.” 

Mark swallows. He doesn’t know how to respond to that. 

“I’m not.” 

“You are, it’s in your face,” Donghyuck’s ankle is warm against his, the Enforcer is wearing shorts. “Don’t pity me. I am a latent criminal, even if I have never committed the crime.” 

Mark bites his lip. “You were a child. How old were you when you flagged? Thirteen, fourteen?” 

“I was a child,” Donghyuck’s voice is serious now, laden with the demons of his past, laced with anger, “but it didn’t mean I didn’t know what I was doing. I knew _exactly_ what I was doing, and what I _wanted_ to do. Even if I didn’t manage to carry out the plan, I had all intentions of doing so. People get put into jail even for the slightest intention to hurt others, Mark. You should know that, they teach you that in the Police Academy, no?”

Mark keeps his eyes on where Donghyuck’s ankle is still wrapped around his. He can’t bring himself to look at the Enforcer, but he feels the younger’s gaze boring into the side of his head. 

“My Crime Coefficient was recorded at 370 when they brought me in,” Donghyuck doesn’t sound bitter, doesn’t sound upset. “I was fourteen years old, but because I was about to commit murder, they didn’t put me with the children. I was different, I wasn’t flagged by the system when I was five. I had a pretty good childhood, honestly. I might even have been like you; gone to SMU, graduated with a top score, had my pick of all the Ministries.” 

Mark shakes his head, tongue swollen with the words he wants to say. He doesn’t know how to say them, doesn’t know how to go about articulating his thoughts. 

“You should have gone.”

“I can’t, Mark,” Donghyuck throws his head back, looking up at the artificial lights hanging above them. “My Crime Coefficient doesn’t go down, like ever. Not when I know he is still alive.” 

“He’s in jail.”

“That’s not enough,” Donghyuck’s voice is dangerous, angry, bitter, resentful, “I want him _dead_ . I want him beaten within an inch of life, I want him to _beg_ me to stop. He doesn’t deserve to live. Trash. Scumbag. He manipulated my mother and beat my sister. One of them lives permanently in a psychology counselling centre and the other goes for therapy every week, all because of his horrible, abusive ass.” 

“He deserves to _die_ ,” the boy Enforcer scoffs, “but yet, his Crime Coefficient doesn’t say that. I’m the one here with a band on my wrist, without any possible chance of being a normal citizen. I hate him. But, I hate the system more. I despise the system that lets him live.” 

Mark can’t stop watching him. It’s like watching a total solar eclipse as the sun is slowly engulfed by the shadow of the moon as the three planets line up in one straight line. The resentment, the pure anger clouds Donghyuck’s face, yet his very being shines better than ever. 

It hurts to look at him, but Mark can’t bring himself to look away.

He _is_ a boy, Mark realises, as he reaches out to take Donghyuck’s hand without thinking. A boy who never stopped loving the people he loves, and continues to love others despite being trapped in a system that had sealed his fate and doomed him to a life of imprisonment. Under the facade of bright smiles, his eyes are sad. 

But yet, Donghyuck still loves. It shines out of his face, despite the cloud of anger that follows him like a shadow, despite the almost black colour of his hue. 

He _is_ just like Mark. A boy living at the mercy of the Sibyl System, but yet, Mark had managed to be on the side that luck favours. Mark hadn’t had an abusive father, he had never failed a hue check in his life ever. He is also at the mercy of the System, everyone is. 

He’s just lucky. Donghyuck wasn’t. 

Donghyuck is right. He could have just been like Mark. 

“I’m sorry.” 

Donghyuck bows his head, his fingers clenching at Mark’s. Seeking, searching, wanting. 

Mark gives it to him, lets Donghyuck cling onto his hand like a lifeline, lets the boy Enforcer stop being an Enforcer for a while and just be a boy. Donghyuck is warm against his side and his head fits right in the space between Mark’s jaw and shoulder. 

Donghyuck cries and cries. Mark just holds his hand tighter. 

\--

“Are you and Donghyuck, like, a thing now?” 

Mark doesn’t dare to look at Jaehyun. The analyst’s normally perfectly coiffed hair is haphazardly held back with a headband, proof that he hasn’t gone home in days. Mark keeps his gaze trained on the table in front of him. 

“Mark Lee.” 

“I don’t know?”

Jaehyun scoffs. Beside Mark, Taeil shoots a look at him. 

“Lay off the boy, Jae. Don’t take your frustration out on him.” 

Jaehyun rolls his eyes and goes back to typing aggressively on his computer. Mark continues looking at the table, and Taeil closes his eyes for a bit. 

“It’s nice though.”

Jaehyun’s voice is strained from lack of sleep, from anger, from irritation. From heartbreak. 

Mark lingers around after Jaehyun is done processing the information and Taeil has left for a coffee run. Jaehyun doesn’t seem surprised, but he doesn’t ask. 

“How is it like, falling for and dating an Enforcer?” 

Jaehyun blinks at him. “Why are you asking that?” 

Mark stares at the table. “I don’t know. Maybe there’s some secret protocol to dating a latent criminal? Some manual called ‘Dating An Enforcer 101’? I don’t know, hyung.” 

Jaehyun’s eyes are on him. There is no pity, no contempt, no judgement. “Have you been in a relationship before? A romantic one, of course.”

Mark thinks back to his girlfriends in high school, his first long term girlfriend Mina, his first gay relationship with Jaemin filled with awkward kisses and fumbling. “Yeah, I’ve had a few.” 

“Is what you feel for Donghyuck different?” 

“Kind of,” he finally looks up at Jaehyun. The analyst meets his gaze, smiles softly. 

“It was both the same and yet so different for me,” his voice is quiet and tender, long fingers playing with a bracelet on his wrist. “When I met Sicheng, he was a quiet, withdrawn boy with so much hatred in his eyes. He spoke Korean in bits and chunks, and cursed out everyone who dared to touch him.” 

Mark thinks of Sicheng; tall, lanky, a tender smirk, face often screwed up in irritation whenever Yuta and Taeil try to smother him with affection. Sicheng who had taken the girl’s hands in his, the girl who was trembling and shaking as she stared at Donghyuck’s unconscious body crumpled on the ground in front of her. He had spoken to her in soothing Chinese, rubbed circles into her hands, and offered to accompany her to the counselling clinic. She had refused to leave his side, tiny hands clasped tightly around his arm, clinging to him like he was a lifebuoy in the dark sea ripped apart by the storm. 

“He’s also gentle, but you know that too. I fell for his gentleness, his resilience, his open acknowledgement of his past. You’ve seen the file on him, you know how much he suffered. It was scary, I didn’t know what to do. I’ve been in love, but never to this extent, and definitely not with a latent criminal.” 

Jaehyun’s voice is a whisper that fills the entire room, a stage for his tale, white rectangles of light as the backdrop and the purr of machines as the background music. 

“But I _love_ him,” Mark presses his lips together, watching as Jung Jaehyun lays bare his heart in front of him. “I don’t see him for his Crime Coefficient, not for his hue, not for his past. I love Sicheng for who he is, and when he told me he loved me back, I was the happiest person on earth. I still am, even if he has to leave me and go to China with Division V, even if I was the one who proposed the break-up because we both know we can’t do long distance.” 

Jaehyun smiles at him, a man so hopelessly in love, but also so sane because of it. 

“There’s no manual for dating an Enforcer, Mark. Because you don’t fall in love with one.” 

_You fall in love with the person. You love the person, not the Enforcer._

“Sicheng isn’t to blame for his own Crime Coefficient. None of them are, honestly,” the analyst sighs, the sound exhaling from him in a whisper. 

“Yuta-hyung, Doyoung-hyung, Ten-hyung, Sicheng, Donghyuck. They didn’t ask to be born into the circumstances that they ended up in. They did a lot of things, willingly, of course. They don’t really regret what they did, or almost did, for most of them anyways. But at the end of the day, they are just like you and me.”

“But you already knew that, didn’t you Mark,” Jaehyun’s eyes are wet, the smile on his face both understanding and pained, his lower lip trembling, the bags under his eyes more prominent in this agonising attempt at keeping his composure in front of the Inspector. 

Mark nods. Jaehyun bows his head to hide his face, to hide the tears. 

“Thank you.”

Mark doesn’t understand. “I didn’t do anything.” 

Jaehyun looks up at him, his smile devoid of pain this time in spite of the tear stains on his puffy cheeks. In this instance, Mark realises it is not only the Enforcers who suffer because of their Crime Coefficients, enslaved to the Sibyl System. Ordinary citizens, they too, are slaves. 

Jaehyun is a victim too. Yet, Mark feels his smile as the older man envelopes him in a hug. 

“Thank you for not trying to save him.” 

\--

The second time Mark shoots Donghyuck, Donghyuck actually gets angry at him. 

Angry is an understatement. Donghyuck is _livid_. 

He rips the IV out of his arm, shoves Mark against the wall and screams at him. Mark is running on four hours of sleep in three days, and nothing goes into his head. Everything is echoey, muffled, muted, and his vision is a blur. But he knows exactly what Donghyuck is yelling about. 

“I couldn’t let you shoot him, Donghyuck.”

Donghyuck scoffs, the disdain clear in his eyes. “You let Yuta-hyung take the shot even though I was closer? Look, sure, Yuta-hyung has really good aim, but I would not have missed.”

Mark can’t look Donghyuck in the eye. “Your Coefficient was pushing its limit.” 

The boy Enforcer laughs bitterly. 

“And that’s your concern, how?” 

Mark feels a surge of irritation in his heart. He shakes his head, trying to clear his vision. Even in the blur of colours and lights, he still sees Donghyuck’s face clearly, crumpled in a mixture of rage, disappointment, and contempt. 

“Listen, _Inspector_ . Do you remember what Inspector Seo told you the first day we met? We Enforcers are hunting dogs, beasts kept on a leash to hunt other beasts. You are the master, we are the slaves. We are _disposable_ , purely because we aren’t even supposed to be allowed to _exist_. Because the system has determined it as such.” 

Mark’s head hurts. “Stop talking like that.” 

Donghyuck’s voice is so full of resentment that it makes his heart throb painfully, the words putting his emotions through a shredder with the mess that is his emotions coming throughout the other side in a messy, tangled pile. “Like what?” 

Mark isn’t even sure if his brain is working anymore. His head, his heart, thrumming at a thousand miles an hour, the emotions choking his throat, threatening to overflow and burst from his chest. _Why doesn’t Donghyuck get it?_

“Like you’re disposable. You’re not.” 

Donghyuck lets out a sob. “Stop it.” 

_Stop what?_

Mark heaves himself up, grabs the boy Enforcer by his shoulders, and kisses him. 

He tastes the sun on Donghyuck’s tongue, pulls him closer with every slide of their lips. Messy, desperate, a kaleidoscope of colours and emotions, the past mixed with the future and the present. Mark swallows the warmth shining out from Donghyuck’s very being, presses himself desperately closer to the boy Enforcer’s body, and asks for _more_. 

Donghyuck kisses him back, pulls the air from his lungs, breathes against Mark’s lips and brands himself into Mark’s chest. He’s scorching, hot with anger, with frustration, but yet he opens his mouth, his heart, himself. He sears an unspoken promise into Mark’s mouth as he grasps desolately at the boy Inspector’s waist and tries to meld their bodies together. 

“I love you,” Mark gasps, fingers in silver hair, their noses pressed together. 

Donghyuck doesn’t cry, his eyes glassy with unspilled tears. 

He repeats the same three words against Mark’s mouth when they are pressed against each other under the sheets on Donghyuck’s hospital bed, limbs tangled awkwardly, his fingers warm against the nape of Mark’s neck. 

_And the boy Inspector falls for the boy Enforcer, who had also fallen for him._

_No_ , Mark thinks, _just two boys who fell in love._

\--

“Hey, take care of Donghyuck, will you?” 

Mark blinks up at Doyoung, seated in the middle of his tiny apartment-cell. The Enforcer is as regal as ever, spine straight, dressed in a black long overcoat with a pale blue button down. His black dress pants are impeccably ironed, his shoes shined to perfection, and the gray plaid tie at his neck tied in a perfect Windsor knot. 

He follows the pale pink stripe running down the tie with his gaze before looking at Doyoung again. There is no steel in Doyoung’s eyes, just some remnants of resignation and sadness. 

“I’ll do my best,” he doesn’t know what else to say. 

Doyoung watches the uniformed men shake apart his books before packing them into metal crates, doesn’t flinch as they pry his shelves off the walls and smash them apart before poking through the splintered planks. 

“That’s good enough. Thank you, for giving him a chance to love, and be loved.” 

Mark thinks about the boy who had cried himself to sleep at the news of Doyoung’s transfer to maximum security, thinks about how he woke up with the same boy in his arms on the couch in the office. He thinks about how the boy is his sun, and how he has become a planet that fell into its orbit, unable to resist the field of attraction, going along with the pull. 

“He gave me one too.” 

Doyoung looks at Mark, and there is something like regret in his eyes. He smiles, a sad turn of his lips, and Mark thinks about the Enforcer’s file hidden in a locked drawer at Johnny’s desk. 

“That's two victories.” 

“Number 960201-127-26, time to go.” 

Doyoung doesn’t look at the man holding the intricate silver cuffs. He steps forward, and Mark smells bergamot and pine, the woodsy scent clinging to Doyoung’s coat. He buries his face into the now _ex_ -Enforcer’s chest, clings to him for a bit as Doyoung hugs him close. 

“Give this to John, will you?”

Mark takes the envelope from Doyoung, nods at him. He watches silently as the silver cuffs are snapped around the dark-haired man’s wrists, the tears welling up behind his eyes as the uniformed men escort him to the door. 

“Goodbye, Mark Lee Minhyung.” 

Mark is left standing alone in the empty space that used to be Kim Doyoung’s apartment-cell, fingers clutching an envelope with nothing written on it. He inhales deeply, tucks the envelope into his coat, and slides into his car before letting himself cry into his hands. 

The envelope smells like sea salt and clean laundry. Like Doyoung’s usual cologne. 

\-- 

“Do you think Doyoung-hyung will be okay?”

Donghyuck’s voice is muffled from where his face is pressed into Mark’s shoulder. Mark thinks about the regret in Kim Doyoung’s dark eyes, the way his coat smelled like Johnny’s chair, the haunted look in the Senior Inspector’s eyes as Mark handed him the envelope. 

“He will be,” he hugs the Enforcer closer to him, “you promised him that you will take care of yourself, didn’t you? Better not break that promise, if not he’ll nag at you when he’s back.” 

Donghyuck swallows, looks up at Mark. “Thank you for being there for hyung.” 

Mark looks down at the plain sheets of Donghyuck’s single bed. “I didn’t do anything.”

“Always saying that,” Donghyuck huffs, pushing Mark against the headboard so that he can clamber onto the Inspector’s lap, leaning up to kiss him gently.

“You do more than you think, Mark Lee. You’re kind, that’s already so much.” 

Mark entwines his fingers with Donghyuck, leans down to taste the sun on Donghyuck’s tongue again. He can never get enough of kissing his boyfriend, even if they had just made out the entire night before. 

_His boyfriend_. Mark’s heart soars. 

“The system sucks,” Donghyuck sighs, head on Mark’s chest, tracing patterns into his bare chest. “First, Sicheng-hyung gets shipped off to China with Kun-hyung and the others. Then, Doyoung-hyung gets his sentence raised to maximum security? It’s not fair. We lost two Enforcers within a month.” 

“It isn’t,” Mark agrees. He presses his cheek against Donghyuck’s head, savoring the warmth as he closes his eyes. “I’m sure they will be fine, especially Doyoung-hyung. He promised that he will be back for sure.” 

Donghyuck nods, hugs him tighter, and Mark’s heart feels like it’s going to burst. 

“Hey,” he waits for Donghyuck to look up at him, the same eyes still bright and sad, but Mark’s heart no longer hurts so much. 

“I love you, Donghyuck-ah.” 

Donghyuck smiles like the sun, and his eyes are brighter than ever, and there’s no sadness in his eyes as he leans up to press a gentle kiss to the corner of Mark’s mouth. 

“I love you too, Markie.”

\--

_That’s two victories_ , Doyoung’s voice echoes in his head. 

**Author's Note:**

> idk i always thought johnny smelled like a tree. that's just me. 
> 
> thank you sincerely for reading. if you enjoyed this, please do leave some kudos and comments! 
> 
> norenmin part next? or maybe johndo, depending on how my brain works. 
> 
> you can find me at [twitter](http://twitter.com/_doively) and [cc](https://curiouscat.me/doivelyz)! come talk to me about nct things!
> 
> as always, thank you vic. ti amo.


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